


Live

by Lauand



Category: Saiyuki
Genre: AU, Light Angst, M/M, mad scientist prompt, rather Black Jack-ish, secret lab
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-11
Updated: 2019-08-11
Packaged: 2020-08-19 07:20:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,341
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20205883
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lauand/pseuds/Lauand
Summary: Hakkai always asks first.(A mad scientist/secret lab/unlicensed surgeon AU.)





	Live

**Author's Note:**

> This was a comment fic written in 2015 that got out of hand. The prompt was “mad scientists” and somehow it originated this. Betaed by the wonderful Avierra (who was also the prompter, that's how lame I am), but any remaining mistake is, of course, mine.

“Do you want to live?”

The light was hurting his eyes, but it wasn't like everything else wasn't hurting too, so Gojyo didn't pay too much attention and thought: yes, oh fuck yes, I do.

\-------------

Gojyo was a bit slower now than he was before, but Hakkai didn't seem to mind. Probably because he hadn't know him back then. It was not that Gojyo was stupid, it just took him a little while to react, like he needed some extra time to make sense of sentences and concepts and actions. He was still an extraordinary assistant and he knew it. Not because Hakkai had told him (he was as sparse with his praise as he was with his feelings, as if he didn't have all that many left and wanted to keep them for a bit longer before losing them all), but because Gojyo could see it. He always gave his very best when helping Hakkai, and he never questioned his choices. Not because he couldn't see some of them were morally wrong, it was just that Gojyo himself didn't have all that much room for judgment.

\------------

He didn't know where Hakkai got his money. Because Gojyo was positive it wasn't from their patients. Sometimes Gojyo made up backstories for Hakkai in his mind. Like, he was the only son of a dead millionaire and had billions in a Swiss bank account. Or he led a double life as a really famous plastic surgeon who only needed to operate twice a year to earn enough to keep his lifestyle. Or he was a researcher for the CIA (although Gojyo suspected the CIA didn't have researchers, but it was the only government agency he could name, so that was that), working on an ultra-secret project that paid a lot. Or he was a high-profile assassin and charged a fortune for each hit.

It didn't change anything. It couldn't change anything. That's why Gojyo never asked, because deep inside, he didn't really care. Hakkai was Hakkai and that was enough for him.

\---------

Sometimes Gojyo got a bit jealous.

It was, strangely enough, not because of Kanan. Kanan hurt him, but it was not jealousy that caused it, it was just an extension of Hakkai's pain. So it was not Kanan that hurt him, it was Hakkai, really.

The jealousy came with every new broken body on the operating table, because he was always there to hear the question.

“Do you want to live?”

It had made him feel special when it had been directed at him. But Hakkai asked everybody, everybody, without exception. Like it was the magic password to unlock his powers as a sorcerer (instead of just a surgeon) which would allow him to perform a miracle and bring dead bodies back to life. Perhaps he wasn't a sorcerer, he was a necromancer. Gojyo was pretty sure that was an actual word and he hadn't made it up, just like so many backstories.

Most people answered “yes”. And Hakkai saved them, just like he had with Gojyo.

So, see, Gojyo felt a little bit jealous every time he heard that question. But it passed, because Hakkai had saved a lot of people, but he kept only Gojyo.

\--------

Gojyo had never asked Hakkai why he wouldn't bring Kanan back to life.

Sometimes, Hakkai would give off this restless vibe. Gojyo had been by his side for a long time and could tell. Other people never seemed to notice. Not that Hakkai was around other people very often, but still. When Hakkai was feeling restless, Gojyo gave him space. So he didn't really follow him when he visited Kanan. But he knew it was her he was seeing. He knew he would stand in front of the glass container and see her float. Kanan was dead, but her body wasn't, not completely. Gojyo wasn't sure if Hakkai talked to her or if he just watched and grieved. Gojyo never asked.

But he remembered the case, back then, before he met Hakkai (or rather, Hakkai met him). And he knew why Hakkai asked everyone he tried to save almost compulsively if they really wanted to live.

Gojyo wanted to tell Hakkai how awesome he thought he was for respecting Kanan's wishes, but he knew Hakkai. He was being selfish. He just didn't want to be hated by the only person who really mattered to him. He would rather be loved by the dead. Gojyo could relate, so he never brought the subject up.

\--------

Hakkai didn't lose patients often, but when he did, he didn't take it well.

The last time it happened, Gojyo didn't know what to do. He worried about Hakkai losing the only thing that made him feel some passion. Gojyo didn't want that, couldn't stand the thought.

So he went to Hakkai and took his hand. Hakkai looked at him, because Gojyo wanted to touch him all the time, but he never did. Gojyo then brought the hand to his scars. They weren't disfiguring scars, they were rather subtle (Hakkai was, after all, an outstanding surgeon), but both of them knew they were there. And why. So Hakkai just brushed his fingers against them and smiled. And that made Gojyo smile, too. Not because they were suddenly happy, but they weren't so sad anymore, and that would have to be enough for now.

\---------

If he had ever wondered why nobody came to ask if Hakkai had a license or what his dead sister was doing floating in a tank in a restricted area of the lab, Gojyo sort of found the answer when he met Sanzo.

Sanzo was a bit of a bastard and a bit of a big fish in the police. Apple of someone's eye. Which was a difficult notion to swallow when you talked to him and realized he was such a jerk that nobody could really love him, right?

That happened to be also belied by the little monkey that was his partner, because it was obvious he adored the bastard. Once he had tried to punch Sanzo and the shrimp had taken him down like Gojyo weighed nothing. And maybe he was not as fast as before, but Gojyo was an excellent fighter, taught in the streets and not in some fancy academy. His pride still smarted a little about it. He had tried to defend Hakkai, and Hakkai was the one who had had to stare Sanzo in the eye and say, in the most pleasant tone in the world: “I would be very much obliged if Goku released my assistant, Sanzo. This very moment, if it's not an inconvenience”.

A lesser man would have pissed his pants, but Sanzo just “tsked”. At the sound, like it was some secret code between them, the monkey had let Gojyo go. The imp had the nerve to smile and offer Gojyo his hand. Frowning, Gojyo had taken it and gotten up.

“Those are cool scars,” the little shit had said then, “do you want to see mine?”

So, Sanzo was a rotten son of a bitch, but Gojyo guessed that Goku was sort of okay.

\------------

There was something about the rain that Gojyo didn't really understand. But he needn't. He just had to go to Hakkai's room and be there. He never said anything. He just got into Hakkai's bed and lay there, facing the wall. Hakkai never said anything either. They didn't really sleep. They didn't really touch. They didn't look at each other. They just were. And even if there was no indication about it, Gojyo felt that it was the right thing to do. To just be there.

\-----------

“You never ask me for anything,” Hakkai said one day.

Gojyo looked at him and didn't reply. Not at first. When he gathered his thoughts, he did.

“No, I don't,” is what he said.

It was easier than explaining that he didn't want anything that could be granted. He wanted something freely given. A request would defeat the purpose, because what he really wanted was not a reaction. It was difficult to put that into words, though, so he decided to keep it simple. It wasn't as if his response was not the purest truth.

\---------

Sometimes, Hakkai looked at Gojyo as if he really wanted to give him everything but didn't know how. Probably, Gojyo thought, he wasn't sure he still had it in him. That was okay, Gojyo tended to tell himself. It was more than he had ever had from anybody. Gojyo could wait, forever if necessary. He didn't really expect anything, so it was fine. If sometimes he wished for more... well, he couldn't really help it, could he? So, when that happened, he just waited until it passed a little bit. He had it under control.

\---------------

At first, Gojyo sucked at cooking. He sucked hard. And the fact was that Hakkai excelled at it, but he sometimes forgot when he was researching, preparing for an intervention or just in a bad mood. When that happened, Gojyo took charge.

The fifth time he set the kitchen on fire, Hakkai decided to teach him.

“It would be really embarrassing to get caught and sent to prison just for a little domestic fire, you realize,” was the reasoning behind it.

Actually Gojyo suspected Hakkai enjoyed teaching, but he didn't open his big mouth about it because he also happened to enjoy being taught.

\---------

They never really talked about it, so Gojyo never found the chance to tell Hakkai that it was not gratefulness that made him stay. He was not trying to repay Hakkai for saving his life. Or, well, maybe there was something of that in why he worked as his assistant, but not in why he took care of him.

It was just... it wasn't only Hakkai. It was also Gojyo who was selfish.

\----------

Gojyo couldn't stand Sanzo, but the thing was that Hakkai's lab was a strictly smoke-free area, so sometimes, when the bastard visited, they ended up both outside sharing a light (because Sanzo was a fucker and never brought his own lighter).

“Give me a light,” Sanzo grumbled.

Gojyo searched his pockets but couldn't find the blasted thing.

“Fuck,” he said.

Sanzo just frowned, and after getting tired of watching Gojyo revise all the possible nooks in his clothing for the third time, he searched his own pockets. He paused when he found something, and finally produced a lighter.

When he had lit his cigarette, Gojyo caught up.

“Hey, you fucker, that's my light!”

He tried to grab the thing but Sanzo dodged him.

“Not anymore,” the bastard said.

“Give it back!”

“Suck my dick.”

“You...”

\----------

“So, I see that you two are best friends now. I'm really happy.”

“Fuck you,” Gojyo and Sanzo replied simultaneously, as if rehearsed.

Hakkai just smiled and kept on cleaning the cuts and applying ice to the black eyes and the bruised knuckles. Gojyo would almost say that the smile was sincere.

Strangely enough, Gojyo and Sanzo started to get along a bit better after that.

\----------

One day, things started disappearing from the lab. It was damn puzzling, because, well, it was a _secret_ lab. And they weren't even valuable, expensive, re-sellable things.

Gojyo's theory was that it was a ghost, which Hakkai found ludicrous.

Hakkai's theory was that it was a ferret, which Gojyo found ridiculous.

It was a fucking ferret.

Gojyo was sure Hakkai had somehow cheated, but he didn't really mean the glare he sent his way when they both started to chase the damned thing throughout the lab. The lab was fucking huge. It had like a million sections with complicated pieces of equipment and hundreds of hiding spots. They baited it with food. It didn't work. They baited it with shiny objects. It didn't work. Hakkai offered it one of Gojyo's socks. The blasted thing grabbed it and started to sprint like the devil was on its heels, but it was only Gojyo and Hakkai, jumping over and diving under expensive and delicate machines to catch a sock-dragging ferret running across the place.

The ferret found a hole in the exterior wall and wriggled away. They ran to the doors and caught sight of a sock turning the corner just when they got outside. It was raining, but neither of them seemed to care as they pursued the damned critter.

“Keep going after it!” Gojyo yelled, “I'll go 'round the building and cut off its escape!”

They did just that, but the ferret slipped between Gojyo's legs and ran on.

“What the...”

Hakkai started laughing at that, without pausing in his running. Gojyo followed him, both in running and in laughing. The ferret led them to the park. Gojyo took off his soaked T-shirt, intending to use it as a trap, but he tripped with a root, or a stone, or who knows what and fell face first into the grass.

Hakkai gave up on the chase and lay down next to him, half wheezing and half laughing his ass off. And that... seeing Hakkai honestly laughing in the rain... that, Gojyo thought, was happiness.

A sock in his face interrupted his very transcendental train of thought.

“Shit!” he shrieked, which only made Hakkai laugh harder.

When he could see again, Hakkai was lifting the ferret and cuddling it to his chest. Gojyo wanted to point out that ferrets bit and Hakkai sort of needed his fingers to work, but the thing was actually nuzzling Hakkai's chin, so he kept his mouth shut.

“Are we keeping it?” he asked instead, with no small amount of dismay.

“I'm inclined to think so, if he permits.”

'He' being the ferret, obviously.

“Sure,” Gojyo said, even if he sounded anything but.

“We'll call you _Jeep_,” Hakkai said to the ferret.

A bit of sunlight pushed its way through the clouds, even if it didn't stop raining. It reflected on Hakkai's eyes. It made them greener than the grass they were still lying on.

“Sure,” Gojyo repeated. Only, this time he meant it.


End file.
